My system is too accurate
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Dallas-My question was related to the statement you made that inferred you could change the sound of your system to a particular recording to make it sound 'better.' My question was how do you do that on the fly for each recording?
Can I ask what is shown in the first beautiful pictures? On axis response, average weighted, power response of the system?
Yes. The program i use takes 9 measurements in my room from 9 different locations set out in it's instructions. Those measurements are then combined into a single measurement which is what I've posted. It's basically a before and after graph, with the after one being the flat downward slope and the second impulse response. It is not meant to be an "average" of the nine measurements because that is not how the omnimic works when taking multiple measurements in a room; It's DIRAC LIVE's proprietary combination. Therefore, I cannot "prove" to anyone that this graph is exactly the room response, but I think others have shown it to be very close.
No doubt it's an improvement with all music I listen to.
Oh yea, remember the daze.
http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threa...oo-accurate-i-cant-stand-it-sometimes.335418/
Been there, done that...........even on my budget I know what he speaks of.
The cure is to walk away from your system for a few weeks, a month - and return with some wine and new song.
Gotta click from critical listening mode to enjoyment listening mode somehow.
If the artists and engineers making the recording produce the sound, it is accurate. You're losing sight of your system's role. The artists, engineers...professionals are creating the art, your system is reproducing their creation. With that said, if you don't like the way it sounds you should do whatever you like with it. Your purchase, your system, your ears, your choice. But you cannot make their art more accurate than what they created. Any alteration of the recorded signal is, by definition, less accurate.
Tim
SH is simply using the same horse for different courses. No surprise it runs better on one of those courses than the other.
That's essentially what he does now (not for every recording, but several different systems with different characteristics); that's what he claims he'd like to get away from.
Another question is how we rank accuracy. Everyone agrees that absolute accuracy is not possible, but how do we check that a system is more accurate than another?
I can see how that would be fun, if you had the space. I can't see myself doing it as a form of equalizing or compensating for recordings, but a headphone system (with a variety of cans), a near field system, some "conventional" box speakers and something seriously omnidirectional, like Linkwitz Orions -- different presentations, different sense of space. Could be fun.
Tim
To me, it all comes down to the source material. Some is recorded well, some not so well. If 70% of the recordings I play on my system sounded good to great (which is the rough estimate Hoffman claimed for his), I'd say that's pretty good.
I grew up in an analog audio world that eschewed user adjustable equalization or tone controls for home audio (I'm obviously not talking about studio gear)- the thinking being that, their very presence in the circuit degraded the sound. Perhaps today, equalizers are more transparent. (I never had occasion to use the Cello stuff at home, so maybe that was decent back in the day). And with digital and room correction and I suppose some 'presets' that are repeatable for given recordings, maybe you can increase the 'average' even more. I wonder though whether end user adjustments, no matter how refined or transparent, can transform a lousy recording into a good one. Or whether I'd even try, in an analog environment, to go to that trouble.
I spent a decent chunk of time today comparing different early pressings of Alice Cooper's Love it to Death. These are U.S. pressings that were done within a year or so of each other, and they sound markedly different. So, other than trying to find the best sounding pressing I can of a given record on vinyl (which often means early, harder to get in great condition pressings), i wind up concluding that it is the recording, i.e. a limitation of the source material, and there's only so much you can do. Some examples where I have multiple pressings of good records that aren't terribly well recorded:
Aqualung- it would take me some time to catalog all the different pressings I have. Some have strengths over others but none sound fabulous, including Hoffman's DCC mastering of that record. (It's more neutral than the MoFi, but that's a back-handed compliment).
LZI- it was a cheap production and sounds 'canned.' I love the record, so I've listened to a variety of different pressings- the best (which I don't have- it is hard to find) is a first press on Monarch, which we compared on my system to an east coast first press and to a UK first press (but not the 'turquoise' which is pretty unobtanium). The best I was able to come up with is a 74 Piros remaster on Monarch which is better than most of the other copies I've heard.
King Crimson "In the Court"- I have an early UK pink label, among other pressings- I've heard a UK first pressing on my system, it was good, but 20th Century Schizoid Man isn't that great even on that uber collectible pressing.
Tull- Benefit- here's a kicker- that record always sounded muted, wooly on the UK first, the US first and later pressings. It was recently remixed and pressed via a digital master and actually sounds better- here, the remix and the digital master did something to improve a murky, compressed sounding record.
Blind Faith- the original UK Polydor is better than the US release, but it isn't a great sounding recording.
Layla- I have several pressings- some tracks sound better than others on an early ATCO B'way pressing but it just isn't a great recording.
I could go on, but you get the idea. Some of these records are iconic, and I'll listen to them despite the fact that they are sonically bettered by records with far less musical merit.
I grew up in an analog audio world that eschewed user adjustable equalization or tone controls for home audio (I'm obviously not talking about studio gear)- the thinking being that, their very presence in the circuit degraded the sound. Perhaps today, equalizers are more transparent. (I never had occasion to use the Cello stuff at home, so maybe that was decent back in the day). And with digital and room correction and I suppose some 'presets' that are repeatable for given recordings, maybe you can increase the 'average' even more. I wonder though whether end user adjustments, no matter how refined or transparent, can transform a lousy recording into a good one. Or whether I'd even try, in an analog environment, to go to that trouble.
I spent a decent chunk of time today comparing different early pressings of Alice Cooper's Love it to Death. These are U.S. pressings that were done within a year or so of each other, and they sound markedly different. So, other than trying to find the best sounding pressing I can of a given record on vinyl (which often means early, harder to get in great condition pressings), i wind up concluding that it is the recording, i.e. a limitation of the source material, and there's only so much you can do. Some examples where I have multiple pressings of good records that aren't terribly well recorded:
Aqualung- it would take me some time to catalog all the different pressings I have. Some have strengths over others but none sound fabulous, including Hoffman's DCC mastering of that record. (It's more neutral than the MoFi, but that's a back-handed compliment).
LZI- it was a cheap production and sounds 'canned.' I love the record, so I've listened to a variety of different pressings- the best (which I don't have- it is hard to find) is a first press on Monarch, which we compared on my system to an east coast first press and to a UK first press (but not the 'turquoise' which is pretty unobtanium). The best I was able to come up with is a 74 Piros remaster on Monarch which is better than most of the other copies I've heard.
King Crimson "In the Court"- I have an early UK pink label, among other pressings- I've heard a UK first pressing on my system, it was good, but 20th Century Schizoid Man isn't that great even on that uber collectible pressing.
Tull- Benefit- here's a kicker- that record always sounded muted, wooly on the UK first, the US first and later pressings. It was recently remixed and pressed via a digital master and actually sounds better- here, the remix and the digital master did something to improve a murky, compressed sounding record.
Blind Faith- the original UK Polydor is better than the US release, but it isn't a great sounding recording.
Layla- I have several pressings- some tracks sound better than others on an early ATCO B'way pressing but it just isn't a great recording.
I could go on, but you get the idea. Some of these records are iconic, and I'll listen to them despite the fact that they are sonically bettered by records with far less musical merit.
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If the artists, engineers and mastering engineers are doing their work in a weak room/system, they will not be accurately hearing their own work when they are making important decisions about how their work should sound. I am not saying wholesale changes are needed but I have abandoned the theory that the professional's final work product is always an accurate representation of what they intended for their work.
Bruce B
WBF Founding Member, Pro Audio Production Member
I start with a microphone and use it with knowledge of it's inherent limitations. I don't use it to compare my system with someone else's system. The objective is to use the mic to correlate good sound with good measurements. It's more of meta-confirmation process.
Sure. Bad rooms and mediocre equipment don't even have to be involved. It could simply be tired or lazy people settling for good enough, or a mastering engineer misrepresenting the intentions of the artist out of ignorance, hubris or under instruction. But the signal coming off of the media is still all your system is capable of knowing. It cannot know the artist's intentions and represent them more accurately through its colorations; "accurate" is still the relative sameness of the signal coming out of the chain compared to the one going in. That doesn't mean you shouldn't alter that signal any way you like, but it does mean that the altered signal cannot be more "accurate."
Tim
I wonder how accurate his system would be [in his observations] when a lightning strike, a train rolling by, a pipe organ or a full orchestra is played back on his system. I don't feel at that point that he would say that his system is "too accurate".
Tom
Tom
I agree with your idea of using measurements as a "meta-confirmation process" - I often do it to set bass.
IMHO most people overestimate the importance of frequency response. A nice, tilted down power response can be a warranty of a reasonable sound, but a rewarding and enjoyable SOTA sound reproduction needs much more than that. For me the main objective can be stated using the words of Nelson Pass:
"We want our products to invite you to listen. We want you to enjoy the experience so much that you go through your entire record collection - again and again. This, by the way, is a very strong indicator."
How we get there is the question.
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